In a major turn of events regarding the golf merger between the PGA Tour and the Public Investment Fund (PIF) of Saudi Arabia, Tiger Woods will be now be the only tour player to be directly involved in the negotiations. Until this point all members of the PGA Tour policy board were involved in the negotiations talks.

Woods was appointed as the sixth player-director of the tour policy board in August 2023. As he recovered from an ankle injury, the 48-year-old golfers soon found himself working behind the scenes along with others in order to help the tour in speeding up the merger talks.

In February 2024, Tiger Woods along with PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan and the other policy board members meet Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the chairman of PIF to talk about this merger. As per the memo later released by Monahan, the meeting seemed to have gone smoothly.

According to reports from the Associated Press, Woods will now be a lone player in the negotiation talks with the Saudis. He will be joined by Monahan, board chairman Joe Gorder, John W. Henry of Fenway Sports and Joe Ogilvie in this.

This report comes on the day when another huge bomb regarding the policy board was dropped. Rory McIlroy, the four-time major champion, was reported to be on his way back in this committee after resigning from his post in November 2023. However, he declined the return to the board while claiming that some people were “uncomfortable” in working along with him.

Tiger Woods spotted scouting Valhalla golf course ahead of PGA Championship

Ahead of the 106th PGA Championship, Tiger Woods was spotted scouting the Valhalla course on Wednesday. This development comes after his original scouting mission was foiled by the rains in Louisville.

This will be Woods’s fourth appearance at the Valhalla golf course. He emerged as the winner in 2000 but had a tough time in his previous outing. While playing with some back pain, he went on to miss the cut in the 2014 edition.

During the scouting mission, Woods was seen wearing a blue outfit and hitting some tee shots. In one post shared by the official X account of the PGA Championship, the 15-time major champion was seen taking notes of his gameplay.

This will be Woods’s first appearance at the PGA Championship since 2022. Due to an ankle injury suffered at The Masters in 2023, he was forced to withdraw from the tournament which saw him miss the PGA Championship at Oak Hill.

He will now be aiming to complete 72-holes of this event for the first time since 2020. In 2021 and 2023, Woods did not play in the event whereas he was forced to withdraw from the 2022 edition due to an injury. At the 2024 Masters, he did manage to make the cut and completed the 72-holes. However, he finished dead last in the leaderboard by shooting 16-over as he played through the pain barrier once again.